Valentine’s Day is coming up and, in addition to being an opportunity to do something nice for your beloved, it can be a lovely bright spot in the middle of winter. Whether you’re buying your girlfriend a piece of jewellery or taking your mum out for a nice dinner, it’s a good idea to pay for your Valentine’s Day gifts with credit cards. Here are three reasons why.

1. Credit Card Rewards

If you have them, cash back credit cards or rewards credit cards are often the best credit cards to use for making your purchases. Even if you have the cash to pay for your purchases you should consider using your rewards card instead, remembering to pay off the balance at the end of the month. If you pay by credit card, you will reap the cashback or other rewards, and if you use put aside the cash you would have spent and use it to pay off your balance at the end of the month you’ll avoid paying interest charges as well.

2. Credit cards with 0% interest rates

With a 0% purchase card, you can buy a pricey item and take your time paying it off without worrying about interest. These cards are by far the easiest way to “borrow” a few hundred pounds for a special purchase. Some of today’s 0% cards offer lengthy zero per cent interest periods.

One example is the Tesco Clubcard Credit Card, which offers 0% interest on purchases for 13 months, 0% interest on balance transfers for 9 months, no annual fee, and 500 extra bonus Clubcard points for signing up. When you first get a 0% purchase card you could set something up to send you a reminder before the 0% period ends. That way you’re less likely to miss the deadline, which will result in your interest rates reverting back to your standard APR, so any balance still outstanding will start to accumulate interest charges.

3. Credit Card Purchase Protection

Your protection under Section 75 of the Consumer Credit Act of 1974 offers you great protection if something goes wrong with the purchase of goods or services. With your Section 75 protection, both the credit card company and the company you made the purchase from are equally liable if something goes wrong, providing the item cost between £100 and £30,000. You do not have to seek compensation from the retailer first, though this is often the easiest way to get the problem sorted, and you are covered if the trader has gone out of business.